Tag Archives: relationships

Gratitude

October 25, 2012 By in Family Tags: , , , , , , 39 Comments

I’ve wanted to write a post about my Mum – DorkyGranny – for months. I tried to write one for Mother’s Day, but it didn’t quite come together. I have heard it said before that stories become easier to tell the more often you tell them, and I’m realising that to be true. I’ve had to tell the ‘story’ of DorkyDad and me so often that I’m now completely comfortable with it, and it flows very easily. I have a fairly set vocabulary and phrases that I will always use when telling people about my marriage, but I haven’t yet found the language that feels right for talking about Mum. She is staying with us this week though, so it seemed like as good a time as any to try again.

The word that first comes to mind when I think about my Mum is gratitude.
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Friendship

October 20, 2012 By in Family, Nostalgia Tags: , , 13 Comments

heart made of leaf

I’ve been pondering the notion of friendship a lot recently, and admitting to myself how hard it sometimes is to have your friends scattered all over the world as we do.

I had a lovely Skype chat with a friend in Australia the other day. I used to schedule those chats for a time when DorkySon was here, but now I wait and do it while he’s at nursery, otherwise the entire hour is taken up by him showing off all the cars in his toybox. We usually manage to catch up every couple of months, and it’s always great to hear how she is settling into her new life, how work is going and all the rest of it. But it’s not quite the same as when we used to sit and watch a chick flick together with a bottle of wine and a pizza. It’s especially hard when there are big things going on in each other’s lives. Celebrating good news (or commiserating about bad news) several weeks after the fact, via computer screen, doesn’t feel quite as effective as an in-person hug!
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Place and Time

October 8, 2012 By in Nostalgia Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , 21 Comments

stained glass window with bird

Sometimes when I can’t sleep at night, I lie in bed and try to remember the exact layout of houses that I’ve lived in. I’ll imagine myself walking around them, picking out as many small details as I can.

There are four that I can remember with real clarity; the house on Harris where I spent all of my early childhood, my Grandpa’s house in Staffordshire, where I used to spend lots of holidays, the farmhouse in the Borders where I spent most of my teenage years, and the house in Edinburgh that I lived in until a year ago.

There are other places that I can remember a few details of. There was a white cottage on Lewis where I lived with my Mum for a year, and then a townhouse in the Borders where I also spent about year. And of course, there were several flats in Edinburgh where I lived as a student. But the memories of those places are a bit fuzzier.
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An Alternative View

June 15, 2012 By in Guest Posts Tags: , , , , 20 Comments

I’ve got a guest post on the blog today – the first ever one I have agreed to publish anonymously – from a father who won’t be able to spend this Sunday with his children. I know he would appreciate your comments.

Father’s Day. A day when children give their fathers hand-made cards, cuddles and another round of unwanted gifts. They do this to let their fathers know how much they are loved and appreciated. Alternatively, it is just a cynical marketing ploy to find another way to guilt consumers into spending money on various assorted tat masquerading as presents.

For some of us though, it is a yearly source of pain or, at best, a reminder of the most precious part of our lives that is missing most of the week. I fall into this camp as I only see my two children one day a week. Their mother asked me for a separation four years ago, we sadly went our different ways and started to think about the future. While I am happy for my ex to have custody during the week since their primary school is a five-minute walk from the matrimonial home, the weekends are still a battleground. Despite my best efforts and appealing to her via mediation, I still only have a limited time with my babies.
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Dad

June 14, 2012 By in Family Tags: , , , , , 8 Comments

practicing wedding speech

Whenever the lovely Donna at Mummy Central asks me to do something, I find it hard to say no… so I’ve been walking around all week trying to compose a post about Fathers Day. I’m bending the rules slightly – it doesn’t feel right to write it in the style of a letter – perhaps because I’m actually going to be seeing my Dad this weekend for the first time in about eight months, so I want to keep all my news for then! But it has given me an excuse to revisit some lovely memories, and look back at some old photos.
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